When I was first studying Buddhism, I was enrolled in Comparative Religion at University, and also learning meditation from a 'self-awareness' style of training centre. At the time, one of my University texts was a book called 'Buddhism: An Outline of its Teachings and Schools' by Hans Wolfgang Schumann. There was something in that book that has always stayed with me - one of those kinds of teachings which arrived at just the right moment. It was the observation that the Prajñāpāramitā sutras were, in most cases, very long, with many thousands of lines of texts - in some cases 108,000 lines. However there was also one version of the Prajñāpāramitā Sutra which was 'the shortest scripture in the world'. It consisted of one letter, namely the Sanskrit letter 'a':

What is the significance of that letter, and how it could a single vowel comprise a Sutra?

Sometimes spirituality is a liberation, and sometimes it's an alibi ~ David Brazier

Two things. The "a" sound is part of every Sanskrit consonant letter, so it is sort of the "universal basis". The "a" is also a negating prefix, like "un-" in English. Therefore "a" is like emptiness that is both universal and negates substance.

1Myriad dharmas are only mind. Mind is unobtainable. What is there to seek?2If the Buddha-Nature is seen,there will be no seeing of a nature in any thing.3Neither cultivation nor seated meditation —this is the pure Chan of Tathagata.4With sudden enlightenment to Tathagata Chan,the six paramitas and myriad meansare complete within that essence.

Astus wrote:Two things. The "a" sound is part of every Sanskrit consonant letter, so it is sort of the "universal basis". The "a" is also a negating prefix, like "un-" in English. Therefore "a" is like emptiness that is both universal and negates substance.

Fairly well sums it up.

Or, "a" both is everything, and negates everything.

You can also check out the dharani methods with each syllable from the medium length Prajnaparamita, starting with "a", for "anutpada", "non-arising", as "all dharmas do not arise".

Astus wrote:Two things. The "a" sound is part of every Sanskrit consonant letter, so it is sort of the "universal basis". The "a" is also a negating prefix, like "un-" in English. Therefore "a" is like emptiness that is both universal and negates substance.

Fairly well sums it up.

Or, "a" both is everything, and negates everything.

You can also check out the dharani methods with each syllable from the medium length Prajnaparamita, starting with "a", for "anutpada", "non-arising", as "all dharmas do not arise".

Once the Blessed One was dwelling in the royal domain of the Vulture Peak Mountain together with 83 monks and many tens of billions of Bodhisatvas who were all abiding together as one skillful expedient device. Furthermore, at that time, at that moment, the Blessed One spoke thus to the Venerable Ananda:

“Ananda, this is the Prajnaparamita in a single feminine letter. For the benefit and happiness of all sentient beings, you should hold it. It goes thus:

“AH.”

When the Blessed One had said this, that whole gathering and the world with its gods, men, asuras, and gandharvas, their hearts full of joy, praised the words of the Blessed One.

Thus the Prajnaparamita in a Single Femine Letter, the Mother of All Sugatas is complete.

"All memories and thoughts are the union of emptiness and knowing, the Mind.Without attachment, self-liberating, like a snake in a knot.Through the qualities of meditating in that way,Mental obscurations are purified and the dharmakaya is attained."

If you believe certain words, you believe their hidden arguments. When you believe something is right or wrong, true of false, you believe the assumptions in the words which express the arguments. Such assumptions are often full of holes, but remain most precious to the convinced.